


Shadows and Shine

by raendown



Series: NaNoWriMo 2020 Drabbles [13]
Category: Naruto
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-18 19:28:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21282041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raendown/pseuds/raendown
Summary: Despite the sunny day around him Izuna needs a little touch of his own personal sunshine to escape the dark thoughts in his mind.
Relationships: Senju Hashirama/Uchiha Izuna
Series: NaNoWriMo 2020 Drabbles [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1533161
Comments: 10
Kudos: 73





	Shadows and Shine

Izuna was grateful to whoever went to all the trouble of raking leaves in the park only to get lazy at the end and abandon their work without actually bagging the pile. It gave him something soft to fall in to when he flopped backwards to stare up at the clouds above, dour mood in direct contrast to the sunny day around him. The leaves were damp, he noted only after stretching himself out in them, but he couldn’t much find it in him to care. A little damp had never killed anyone before.

He’d been lying there for somewhat more than an hour with his thoughts spinning in endless useless circles when the sunlight parted around the handsome face that appeared over top of him, long brown hair spilling down like curtains to block out the world.

“I take it you’re not feeling any better than this morning?”

“No, not really.” Izuna closed his eyes to accept the grounding touch when Hashirama reached down to brush a leaf away from his forehead.

“Would you mind a little company?” his partner asked.

The wordless grunt he gave in response was taken as he meant it, acquiescence without the energy to find any fancy words to say so. Hashirama carefully curled himself down in to a seiza position just above Izuna’s head where he could pick leaves out of the long hair spread carelessly through the pile. After he’d groomed to his heart’s content he moved on to stroking the lines of Izuna’s face and that was even nicer.

“Have you spoken to your brother again yet?”

“No.” Izuna pouted. “I thought you were coming over to make me feel better, not to make me think about things.”

“It would probably make you feel better to talk to your brother,” Hashirama pointed out. Even worse, he was probably right, though Izuna wasn’t really inclined to say so out loud.

“What if you went and talked to him instead and I’ll just stay here? I’m already rather comfy and you do the guilt trip thing much better than I can. Which, by the way, is unfair. I’m his last brother, I should be able to guilt him in to…in to…” He trailed off as the words choked in his throat.

Hashirama bent to kiss him ever so gently on the forehead. “To being more careful on his missions?”

All Izuna could do was nod. That was all he wanted and he didn’t think it was too much to ask, for his last big brother to use a little more caution when he walked in to dangerous situation after dangerous situation, always so wrapped up in his own ego that he couldn’t seem to recognize that it wasn’t just his own skill keeping him alive. Pure dumb luck was probably the only thing that had prevented him from coming home in a body scroll. His head was getting so fat lately that Izuna was left chewing his fingers to the bone with worry every time the idiot left for a new mission.

There were already enough graves hidden in the forest with coffins holding the three brothers he’d never had a chance to know. As the baby of the family Izuna had still been learning to walk when they lowered a third body in to the ground but he felt the empty places in his soul where they should have been every day. Every damn day he knelt at the shrine inside their home and thanked the gods for keeping Madara there at his side. Without the last of his brothers Izuna wasn’t sure he would know how to continue along the path ahead of him.

“Don’t get lost in there,” Hashirama's voice called him back out of his thoughts softly. “If you’d like me to I will talk to him.”

“Okay.”

“What else can I do to make you feel better?”

Izuna reached up to catch his partner’s hands and hold them to his face, eyes still closed. “Don’t die. I can’t lose you either.”

His breathe stuttered in his chest when he opened his eyes at last to find Hashirama looking back at him with so much more love than he would ever know what to do with. Finding a way to show this man how much his love meant was a task that would take the rest of their lives and, honestly, Izuna didn’t mind the thought of it.

“I’ll always be here for you,” Hashirama whispered in the private little space between the sheets of his hair, a separate universe just for them.

“You’d better be,” Izuna retorted.

Hashirama laughed and the sound was joyful, easy, and just what he needed to hear. One of the knots inside his chest eased just enough for Izuna to smile very slightly. Things would be alright. As long as he had his brother and his beloved partner everything would always be alright.


End file.
